On Comedy, Stereotypes and Expression

Alumni Voice

On Comedy, Stereotypes, and Expression Harshad Pathak (Batch of 2014)

Harshad Pathak explores the propriety of the usage of gender stereotypes in comedy and how the conflicting rights may be viewed keeping in mind factors such as the audience, and the need for defining new boundaries within comedy about the permissible limit of offensive jokes.

At the outset, I would ar ticulate the par ticular question that I seek to address herein - whether the use of gender stereotypes in comedy, by itself, renders such speech socially inappropriate or offensive? This question assumes greater significance if the stereotypes involved are oppressive towards women, considering the very patriarchal nature of our s o c i e t y. I a m a l s o n o t attempting to argue that a speaker is conferred with a rather unfettered discretion to utter any speech with no regard to its consequence.

Instead, I will focus on a more preliminary inquiry as to the existence, if at all, of some autonomy of an artist to use gender based stereotypes in comedy. The question of defining the extent to which gender based stereotypes may be used in order to evoke humour will only arise if such usage is considered to be

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socially acceptable in the first place.

What is meant by ‘ c o m e d y ’ ? To my understanding, comedy is a sub-set of humour. While humour refers to the domain of what is funny or amusing in life, whether accidental or deliberately contrived, comedy may be understood as the subdomain of the humorous, in which humour is turned into art by an individual or a group of ar tists, who may be amateur or professional.

Hence, comedy involves the deliberate employment of a thought, usually through a joke, to create something h u m o r o u s. H owe ve r, i n addition to creating humour, comedy as a form of speech and expression, tends to have s e ve r a l o t h e r i n c i d e n t a l consequences, which may or may not have been intended.

This is precisely why it is necessary for both an artist engaging in comedy, as well as the society, to continuously evaluate the content of c o m e d y. T h i s i n c l u d e s assessing questions as to the appropriateness of using gender stereotypes as the basis of humour in a patriarchal society. For the sake of brevity, I will henceforth refer to the jokes based on gender stereotypes as ‘gender jokes’.

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I believe that certain kinds of ‘low level’ expressions ought to be afforded a higher protection, or a higher level of tolerance, independent of any value that it might possess, and in doing so, the context in which the expression takes place ought to be taken into consideration.

Notwithstanding an artist’s intention, gender jokes may have an i n a d ve r t e n t e f f e c t o f e i t h e r normalizing or legitimizing or even trivializing the underlying stereotypes.

This tendency is heightened in an increasingly patriarchal society. A joke implying that women belong to the kitchen may reinforce the resonating belief that a woman is meant to perform only a subordinate or supportive role within a family structure. Likewise, a joke built around using chloroform as an “icebreaker” on a date may have an effect of trivializing the offence of rape.

One must be mindful that the Constitution of India only strives to protect a citizen’s right to freedom of speech and expression from arbitrary State-action. It does not create a notion of consequence-free speech.

Accordingly, the role that an audience plays in influencing the content of comedy that it is subjected to on a regular basis cannot be undermined.

This includes the right to give a standing ovation, or protest against the use of content deemed to socially inappropriate, to equal extents.

However, this crucial role played by the audience comes with a sense of responsibility as well. For we live in a society where both, the principle of gender equality and the freedom of speech and expression, are in a rapid decline. As such, any attempt to characterize certain kind of comedy as socially inappropriate or harmful must involve a holistic consideration of multiple factors, which are iterated below.

First, in determining the extent to which a State may regulate everyday speech and expression, one often attempts to decipher the level of protection afforded to such speech or expression. In doing so, courts tend to consider the ‘value’ attached to the speech or expression in question.

The type of expression that holds the highest value, such as political speech, is granted the strongest

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protection, while less rigorous standards of review will apply to a lower value expression. While this parameter is relevant in considering the permissibility of regulation of speech and expression by a State, I believe that a similar approach is well suited in trying to determine the social appropriateness of a speech or expression as well. However, the problem is that an assessment of the ‘value’ associated to a particular speech or expression is dominantly linked to its content, with only incidental emphasis, if at all, on the context. This is the reason why I consider it appropriate to take into consideration not just the ‘value’, but also the ‘level’ of a particular speech or expression.

I believe that certain kinds of ‘low level’ expressions ought to be afforded a higher protection, or a higher level of tolerance, independent of any value that it might possess, and in doing so, the context in which the expression takes place ought to be taken into consideration. Assume a hypothetical spectrum wherein on one end is ‘high level’ expression - normally intended to be widely disseminated, well prepared and researched in advance, presented with authority and supported with considerable resources to evaluate the legal risks.

At the other end of the spectrum is ‘low level’ expression, constituting casual speech, with little prior thought about the risks, and includes a conversation between friends in the street, or even a pub event. While the high value/low value distinction is based on the content of expression, the high level/low level distinction is based on the context in which the expression is made. The lower the level of speech, the relatively higher protection or tolerance it merits. [See Jacob H. Rowbottom, To Rant, Vent and Converse: Protecting Low Level Digital Speech]

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When tested against this anvil, I believe that gender jokes, or comedy in general, must lie somewhere on the lower side of the above-mentioned hypothetical spectrum; thereby, meriting a relatively higher standard of tolerance from the society. Indeed, the precise positioning of gender jokes on the aforementioned spectrum will vary with factors such as the size of the audience, whether the author is a professional artist in a position of influence etc., but the fact that such jokes are casual in nature, and are prepared with little thought about the social implications, indicates that it is difficult to

gender stereotypes may be exploited by artists in a position of influence through comedy. However, a due consideration of the context makes it difficult to argue that the very existence of gender jokes, including those built on stereotypes deemed oppressive to women, is problematic or socially inappropriate.

categorize them as a ‘high level’ speech. This is not to say that a sexist statement, when put forth as comedy, automatically becomes socially appropriate. Neither does it suggest that comedy, by its very nature, is immune from content-based criticism. The only inference drawn is that in determining the social appropriateness of gender jokes, significant regard must be had to the fact that more often than not, comedy constitutes low level speech. Accordingly, what may otherwise be construed as inappropriate or offensive, may still be deemed an acceptable form of comedy. I am inclined to reiterate that there is still a pressing need to define the extent to which

of considerable significance. Comedy is an effective tool to criticize, condemn, and call out the negative social constructs in a society, through satire or targeted jokes. The Twitter Account of “Khap Panchayat”, rolling out some hilarious, but offensive tweets, is one example of how one can laugh at the downright ridiculousness of caste and gender based practices in India, without trivializing the issue. Similarly, Zoe Lyon’s comic routine of comparing homophobia with arachnophobia, i.e. the fear of spiders by stating - “Darling, there’s a homosexual in the bath; please could you get rid of it for me!” – is another way in which comedy is used to point out social flaws.

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Second, while gender jokes may tend to normalize or legitimize certain oppressive gender-based constructs in a patriarchal society, it will be unwise to lose sight of the fact that comedy is also a positive social tool

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Alumni Voice Alternatively, comedy can provide us an opportunity to temporarily view ourselves and/or our society in a lighter vein to derive amusement, without attaching any consequences. It allows us to laugh at our individual or social flaws, without diluting their severity. For instance, I, an ardent believer in gender equality, and many of my colleagues, who classify themselves as feminists, bear no guilt in finding this joke funny - “Feminist Irony – Equal Pay at Subway”- despite it being built around the so called ‘Sandwich Joke. I find it difficult to argue that such jokes also reinforce the stereotype on which they are based. Accordingly, it is crucial to acknowledge that gender jokes may, either deliberately or inadvertently, have var ying consequences in a society, which can be both positive and negative. Further, speculating or predicting the possible consequences of a joke or its interpretation by an audience, is marred with subjectivity that creates abundant scope for disagreements. The same joke on domestic violence, cracked by Abish Mathew at the University, is capable of being heard by an informed audience as either trivializing the offence, or as mocking those who engage in such acts.

Likewise, a joke demonstrating how an Indian wife may behave while engaging in oral sex with her husband can be either construed as positioning an Indian wife as a mere source of sexual gratification for her husband, or mocking the sexual incompetence of an Indian husband. This subjectivity involved in predicting the consequences of a gender joke suggests that labeling the mere usage of gender based stereotypes in comedy as being socially inappropriate is over-cautious, and also undermines the multiple roles that comedy can play in a society.

There is another reason behind my argument. In challenging the very existence of gender jokes, we run the risk of attaching a social taboo to the use of sex and gender in comedy, and deprive artists an opportunity to use the same as a social tool. I have heard stories of how the sexual offences, listed under the Indian Penal Code, have been taught by Professors at various Indian Universities without using the word ‘sex’. I do not wish for comedy to suffer the same fate. Of course, this does not imply that the use of gender stereotypes in comedy must go unchecked. However, doing so is more a question of defining the extents to which gender stereotypes

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can be used in comedy, as opposed to questioning their relevance to comedy per se.

Third, while the role of an audience in influencing the content of comedy before it cannot be overstated, it comes with its own limitations. Just like an artist does not have a right to an audience that appreciates his or her jokes, the audience does not have a right to have its criticism accepted. Social response to comedy, no matter how significant, is at the end subject to the autonomy of the artist, and the same must be recognized as being legitimate even if its exercise is considered unacceptable against certain subjective parameters. After all, within the boundaries of the law, the ultimate autonomy over the content of a speech and/or expression vests with the speaker. Unfortunate as it may sound, we may hope that an artist goes the Louis CK way, and respond to certain protests by acknowledging that women have a narrow corridor, and there may be a need for artists to not crack rape jokes. Yet, for every Louis CK, there will also be Daniel Tosh, who will believe otherwise, without necessarily being a sexist person (something which The Daily Mirror found out the hard way in a libel suit filed by Frankie Boyle of all the people).

Simply put, the audience, to a large extent, has the capacity and the responsibility to shape the content of comedy. However, the same occurs on the basis of subjective parameters, and involves a stark difference of opinion, each with sufficiently credible reasons. The same is the case with gender jokes as well. The right of an audience to influence the content of comedy through any manner considered appropriate is as sacred as the right of an artist to create, and subsist with a particular kind of comedy.

Neither is independent of the other, and both deserve respect and recognition in a society. On the one hand, there are women who have historically been oppressed by a myriad of social constructs.

However, on the other hand are artists, which include stand-up comics, whose space for comedy is diminishing under threat from the political henchmen, religious fundamentalists, patriotic goons, and even over-cautious and morally opinionated judiciary. As such, while comedy is certainly not a consequence-free speech, and one cannot undermine the need to define few boundaries, use of gender stereotypes in comedy, by itself, ought not to be considered socially inappropriate.

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